2008 Men’s Olympic Soccer Tournament Matchday One Roundup

The odd thing about the Olympic football tournament is that all the games seem to happen at once, rather than being spread out evenly as in other tournaments.

There are reasons for this, obviously, and for once they’re nothing to do with Sepp Blatter or the Court of Arbitration for Sport. I assume it’s basically because there’s much going on - including the parallel women’s soccer tournament - that the hosts need the venues for other events.

Can’t argue with that, but the upshot is nearly a weeks worth of tournament football in one Olympic evening. Which is quite a lot to take in.

I’ve done my best to put together a round up of all the action below, with video where possible (and assuming the ones I’ve posted haven’t been taken down by the overzealous authorities.) So read on for all the results and (hopefully) some video.

Australia 1-1 Serbia - Group A

Ruben Zadkovich and his dodgy faux hawk (are those things still fashionable somewhere?) gave the Olyroos the lead from a narrow angle, but young Chelsea defender Slobodan Rajkovic equalized for Serbia with a 78th minute header. Obviously Australia didn’t read our 20 Players to Watch post yesterday.

Argentina 2-1 Cote d’Ivoire - Group A

Leo Messi struck first for Argentina, running on to a beauty of a through ball from Juan Roman Riquelme. Sekou Cisse equalized with an impressively powerful early second half header, but Lautaro Acosta by getting to the rebound of a Leo Messi shot.

Japan 0-1 USA - Group B

Looks like Japan had a couple of chances to take the lead, and maybe a shout at a late penalty. But Stuart Holden’s goal after a good run down the right from Marvel Wynne was enough for a US win.
Not a great performance, but our USA bloggers will take it.

Netherlands 0-0 Nigeria - Group B
The two potential medalists failed to produce any goals, which is lucky because I failed to find any video of the game. The Dutch apparently had Roysten Drenthe, Ryan Babel, Jonathan de Guzman and Roy Makaay all on the field at once but failed to score.

Brazil 1-0 Belgium - Group C

Brazil left it late, but in the 79th minute São Paulo midfielder Hernanes scored this fantastic goal for a 1-0 win. Ronaldinho wore the captain’s armband but didn’t make a huge impact, though he made a threatening dribble down the left and had a free kick on target.

Belgian captain Vincent Kompany was apparently having a great game before being sent off for a second booking. And three minutes after Kompany got his marching orders, Hernenaes scored. Belgium also had Merouane Fellaini sent off towards the end to finish with nine men.

As Bruno says on Brazil Offside “Dunga’s ass was saved for the day, thanks to Hernanes and the ref.”

China 1-1 New Zealand - Group C

Jeremy Brockie broke the hosts offside trap for this great near post strike…

… but Man Utd benchwarmer Dong Fangzhuo came off the Chinese pine to equalize with a great header.

Honours even then, but these two could easily be the Group C whipping boys.

Honduras 0-3 Italy - Group D

Someone in Italy must be keen to keep 21 year old Sebastian Giovonco under wraps, because this video was a bitch to find. The tiny (seriously) Juventus pulled all the strings for Italy, including scoring an absolute beauty with his left foot to make it 1-0 Penalties from Giuseppe Rossi and Acquafresca made the final score 3-0.

Reaction from the Italy blog here.

South Korea 1-1 Cameroon - Group D

Park Chu Young put Korea ahead with this free kick, that seemed to evade everyone and everything but the bottom right corner of the goal.

But Georges Mandjeck equalize for Cameroon in the 81st minute with this strike.